Legends of Tomorrow: A Head of Her Time

When even Ray is making that face at your team building exercise, you’re in trouble.

The Legends remain split up this episode, with different members off attending to various tasks. Most of the team goes after a new Encore, some are dealing with one of their member’s dark past, and a few are off on personal business. Even with their forces divided, the team managed to come out “A Head of Her Time.”

Things start off in Northumberland, where Gary and Charlie wait for Constantine, who is locked in a room with a mad ghost. Impatient and worried about his master and/or lover, Gary finally steps in, and that goes about as well as you’d expect. Ava and Sara have a nice little domestic scene in the Waverider’s bathroom, and Zari eavesdrops to learn one of Ava’s weaknesses. Meanwhile, in Hell, Astra is losing patience with her own scheme, and ups the ante to come after her biggest foe.

We learn who the ghost is, and her tie to Constantine, and it’s suitably dark and tragic for the warlock’s past. For reasons never made quite clear, Charlie seems to be siding with the ghost more than Constantine, while Gary is once again mostly comic relief. On the Waverider, Ava is temporary captain because Sara has to go attend to personal business. In-world, this is her attending Oliver Queen’s funeral (I still want to know why Ray didn’t go), and behind the scenes, this gives actress Caity Lotz time to prepare, as she’s directing the next episode. There are mixed reactions to Ava being in charge, but she manages to find something for the team to do to keep them busy. Zari still isn’t thrilled with being on the ship, but is intrigued by the possibilities of some of Gideon’s capabilities.

Long distance relationships are hard, especially when one them is a Legend and the other is a wandering Fairy Godmother. Nora and Ray’s video chat gets interrupted when Mick comes in to sickbay with some odd symptoms. Ray’s attempt at an explanation for what’s actually going on with Mick gets interrupted when Ava summons the team for a meeting. Her attempt to lead the same way she did the Time Bureau doesn’t work, but a conveniently timed disturbance focuses the team’s attention elsewhere.

Arriving in 1763, the team tries to figure out what’s wrong in France, as Zari uses the conversation she overheard to play Ava badly. Zari uses her social “it girl” skills to get them all into an exclusive event, where nothing is going like it should. We also see Zari demonstrate her new perfume that’s due to debut soon, and, from Ava’s reaction, it still needs some work. While Ava and Zari disagree over fan use, Astra steps up her nasty schemes in Hell. Back in his house, Constantine shares parts of his past with Charlie and Gary, getting corrected by Natalie’s ghost when he strays from the truth.

Predictably, Zari is a hit at the party and Ava is all wrapped up in trying to figure out who the Encore is. Nate chats with Zari a bit, and isn’t happy hearing that she has a boyfriend. The party proves to have luminaries such as Napoleon and Marie Antionette there, and a very odd effect begins sweeping the crowd, spreading to Ray, Nate, and Behrad. Weirdly, Marie Antoinette looks a lot like Nora (both played by the same actress, in fact) but, while this gets mentioned a few times, we never learn anything about why that might be. Zari and Ava, last Legends standing, figure out what’s going on, or at least part of it, as things take a serious turn. Zari comes up with a plan, but she has to do some work with Ava first.

Bit by bit, more of one of the most tragic incidents in Constantine’s life gets revealed, as Charlie makes various comments and Gary continues to be incompetent comic relief. Zari gets them where they need to be, but then, of course, things start going off the rails. There’s action, fighting, fleeing, re-decapitation, and some commentary about the fashions of the day. Crisis solved, at least for now, Zari more or less ignores the compliments she gets and refocuses on a big PR event she has planned that she wants to get back to.

Constantine gets pushed into making some admissions, and told he needs to go about his next big task for the right reasons, all of which rattles the warlock. Zari has a conversation about popularity with an unlikely source, and then gives Gideon some commands, although she can’t get the AI’s name quite right. Breaking one of Ava’s earlier stated rules, Zari learns about a personal disaster coming for her, and takes some extremely questionable steps to correct it. While Zari’s at her event, assorted chaos breaks out in her wake on the Waverider.

From a stunt by her manager to an accident with a powerful artefact, Zari’s party doesn’t go at all how she thought it would. Ray and Mick have some very Keystone Kops moments trying to corral a problem, but finally get matters in hand. With that taken care of, Ava leads a team to go sort out Zari’s problems, or some of them. Things in Northumberland take a turn when Constantine finds out one of his companions knows more than they’re telling about something important, which is revealed to have been affected by some of the ripples from Crisis.

Zari and Behrad get a nice little scene together, bonding over wardrobe changes and donuts. When Sara holo-conferences in to see how things are going, Ava is touched by the team covering for her. Zari has a snack, some flashbacks, and a good chat with Ava that bodes well for her future with the team. The show ends with some really bad developments in Hell that immediately have an effect on one of heroes, which is the cliffhanger we end on.

What I liked: I’m really glad Zari’s shallow party girl persona is already undergoing some changes. That would have gotten old fast. I got a chuckle out of Nate’s interaction with her boyfriend, and I’m intrigued by Mick’s problem. They covered Sara leaving well. I was surprised by the reveal near the end in Northumberland, and am looking forward to seeing how that plays out.

What I didn’t: Unless they were just making some weird joke, the Nora/Marie thing really needs to get explained. Mick finally gets to use his gun, and it gets turned against him almost immediately. Once again, Ray doesn’t use his suit, although it would have been useful a few times.